documenting my journey from a stable, professional career to a traveler around the world

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Day 92 - Back to Kuala Lumpur

The flight back to KL took about 2.5 hours, and there were a surprisingly good amount of Myanmar people aboard the flight. I was curious as to how or why they were traveling outside of the country, since their wardrobe made it appear that they were not going on business, but possibly for leisure. It was obvious that for many of them, this would be the first time they flew on an airplane. I sat next to a two Myanmar people and asked them what they were going to do in Kuala Lumpur. Unfortunately, they didn't speak English, so I tried to see if they were going to work there, tour the city, or maybe even fly to Singapore to work since I hear it's popular for Myanmar people to work there. They still didn't understand so I gave up.

Arrived in KL around midnight, and luckily, my couchsurfing host, U-Chop, was awake to have me over this early in the day, or else I would have had to sleep at the airport. I arrived at his place, and it immediately reminded me of home, with many IKEA furnishings throughout. It felt nice being in a home, instead of a hotel/guest house. We chatted a little when I arrived, and I learned that he, being Muslim, was celebrating Ramadan along with much of the KL population for the entire month, which meant fasting from dawn until dusk. He would later wake up around 6am to eat before the sun rose.

I wondered how the local restaurants would have been affected by such a holiday, but U-Chop said that business wasn't affected too much, as there were a great number of Chinese in the area who would still be customers during the day, and Malay Muslims being customers at night. This was later empirically resolved by my observation at a couple of the malls in the city, the great number of people who were crowded around all the restaurants including the McDonalds (where I just HAD to satisfy my Big Mac craving).

Spent the rest of the day sightseeing a little of Chinatown (Petaling Street), before the rains came. They usually come in the afternoon/evening, and when it rains here, it pours.

It was nice to come back to a highly developed, and clean city. I very much enjoyed the airconditioning everywhere and just sitting around at a mall, reading a book and people watching.